The UK's High Court has ruled that a Government "stealth cut" that could reduce public-sector pensions and benefits by £11bn a year was legal, but trade unions, who brought the challenge, plan to appeal.

The UK's Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, announced in his first budget in June 2010 that public-sector pensions would in future be paid out in line with the Consumer Prices Index, instead of the Retail Prices Index, a generally-higher measure of the rate of inflation.